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Winnipeg Demands Immobilizers on High-Risk Cars
mytrip writes with a Reuters article about a new, unusual insurance requirement for drivers in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Apparently Winnipeg is one of the worst cities in Canada for auto thefts. New and 'high-risk' cars will now be required to install an electronic immobilizers in order to qualify for car insurance. "Chomiak said cars are stolen twice as often in Winnipeg as in other Manitoba cities, while a 2005 report from Statistics Canada said the city had a higher per-capita car theft rate than larger cities like Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto. The province, where cars are insured through Manitoba Public Insurance, will fork over C$15 million ($14 million) so that owners without immobilizers can have them installed."
First thought: electronic immobilizers - why bother? Isn't the way to steal cars these days with a laptop to reprogram all the systems so that the actual think actually drives? How difficult would it be to bypass the immobilizer? Seems to me that they could spend the $14m on installing CCTV or having more police on the street.
ahem... This is the Anti-Libertarian discussion forum, right?
I was going to mod you +1 Insightful, but you left out the actual option the insurance companies choose:
The insurance companies realise that by charging the fewer higher-risk customers more, they can charge the rest of their customers fractionally less. Thus, the insurance company makes more money, attracts more customers, and responsible people end up playing almost as much as they would anyway!
In other words, insurance companies are screwing you either way - regardless of whether your a chain-smoking crap-eating poor driver, or a non-smoking healthy-eating good driver.
The situation is rapidly approaching the point where it's almost worthwhile to take the money you'd pay in insurance and invest it yourself. The only problem with that it you're only averaging risk one way - temporally. It would be worth it if you could get a few people together, form some sort of co-op, hire some actuaries to gauge risk, set premiums appropriately... hey, then you could sell policies to other people, get greedy, screw them over bothways, and make shitloads of profit!
What part of "a well regulated militia" do you not understand?
Immobilisers have been a legal requirement for all cars in the UK for nearly 10 years now. Generally, they're the "microchip in the ignition key" type you describe.
And no, they're not impossible to work around - otherwise anytime someone lost their keys they'd have to write off their car - but they involve more work than your average teenage joyrider is prepared to put in.
This has led to a number of alternate attack vectors being used for car theft:
1. Steal the keys first then the car from the owners driveway. Easy enough if they leave the keys in a bowl by the front door.
2. Carjacking. (Oh wonderful, we've replaced the essentially non-violent crime of car theft with the rather more violent crime of carjacking)
3. Steal an older car.
You occasionally hear of more sophisticated things going on - like showing up in an official-looking tow truck and lifting the vehicle, with a view to sorting out "how to start the damn thing" at leisure - but that's pretty rare.
I know a guy who did this with his extended family. He said it's amazing how driving attitudes and general care changed when the insured were also the (significant) "shareholders". Additionally, during the time he had this arrangement in operation, they actually ended up with so much money they decided to distribute dividends.
This was in Australia, where the insurance scope was for the insured vehicle and third party property damage. Third party injury etc is covered under a compulsory basis, usually paid with the annual registration fees.
I guess that this is how insurance companies actually start. They would then on-sell the risks they couldn't manage to a reinsurance company.